


You Got Yourself Stuck in a Moment

by afalcone10



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: F/M, i don't even know what this is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-22
Updated: 2016-03-22
Packaged: 2018-05-28 06:57:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6319186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afalcone10/pseuds/afalcone10
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One shot of Karen's POV during her first official meeting with Frank. Well, the first one where he isn't shooting at her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Got Yourself Stuck in a Moment

**Author's Note:**

> I was so struck by this scene. I'm only halfway through the second season but I'm already so intrigued by Frank and Karen.

_Set in Season 2, Episode 6: “Regrets Only”_

 

 ...

She’s the first to enter. And everything is so blue.

Blue walls. Blue sky, so innocent and beautiful and accessible from a room that’s anything but. Blue-white from the fluorescent lights in the ceiling, so bright and harsh like the blue of a Bunsen burner flame. 

Blue blanket over white-blue hospital gown.

Blueish bruises. Yellow ones too. Red tape outlining the three feet around the bed.

“Oh my God,” Karen breathes, before she catches herself.

Matt steps up, almost stepping over the tape. And he starts talking. And the Punisher, Frank, looking like he’s got not a care in the world even though he’s up against everything, starts talking back. Amazingly. 

She looks up at that, stares down the man who tried to shoot at her—shoot her?—and is surprised that after a couple moments pass, he looks over at her.

He keeps his eyes on her. Well, definitely at least one eye; the other is a little puffy and his head is resting on a pillow and tilted so far back she can’t really see the eye on the left and the one eye she can see is hooded and dark. But his head’s swiveled in her direction and, well, he’s looking at her.

Matt’s talking about how Frank was slapped with a DNR the last time he was in a bed in this hospital—not the last time he was in this hospital, because that was when he was shooting at her—and Frank still looks at her. Watches her.

Foggy, hovering a couple steps behind her, says his bit about the shooting order and Frank’s head doesn’t move an inch.

She can sense that even when she’s looking down at the floor, her hair covering her face like she always makes it when she needs a moment to think. It’s unnerving, this attention, and why wouldn’t it be? After all, the last time he looked at her was through the viewfinder of his sniper rifle thing.

And yet. And yet, she finds herself adding, “We know because we heard it given,” almost as soon as Foggy’s finished, before Foggy or Matt could cut in.

It’s not hard to guess where he’s looking when she says that. She’d bet her life it’s at her and really, that’s pretty much what she is literally doing anyways. Still, she lifts her head up just so, flicking the hair out of her face. _We know_. _We know._

They lock eyes. _I know._

After Matt resumes talking, Frank switches over to look at him and she inadvertently does so too, following his gaze. Matt, he’s just standing so tall, so close, all straight lines compared to hunching over and leaning into her kiss last evening on her stoop.

That was last night. This is now and in the Punisher’s hospital room, so she stops that thought and snaps back to attention. Frank. Frank’s family.

She steps forward before she knows what she’s doing, stops herself once she realizes what’s going on. Frank hasn’t even agreed to their representation—he’s barely said a sentence and strangely enough, the most he’s done is stare at them. At her.

“We’re talking about your life, Mr. Castle. We can help you keep what’s left of it,” Matt ends with, strongly in her opinion. Frank thinks otherwise.

“Hmmph,” he grunts, looking off to the side philosophically while sounding like a know-it-all frat guy. “Kind of like what you did for Grotto.”

He’s not looking at her and she knows, she has to, that it’s on purpose. He’s trying to get a rise out of her. He’s the one that killed Grotto. He’s the one that tried to kill Grotto when the fucker was hobbling in front of her, following her to the car, sitting in the passenger seat while she drove like hell to get them out of there. While this man right in front of her tried to kill him. That was all him and yet he sounds like he’s blaming them.

That’s _it._ She’s had _enough._

She steps forward, her heels replacing his heart monitor as the loudest thing in this morgue as she strides purposefully over the red tape. A simple family photo is her weapon of choice and she wields it with ease.

Matt stumbles forward, even Foggy comes rushing toward them from halfway across the room, and Frank doesn’t look away from her face. Even as Matt drags her away, Frank doesn’t look away from her face until he gets a better idea of what that picture really is. Then it’s like that’s all he can see.

“Where did you get that?” he growls. Strangely, it’s not the least bit terrifying, even if it’s the first time he’s ever addressed her. His voice lost that mocking tone that he’s put on since they got in the room, thank God.

His eyes are wide open now, both of them.

“From your home,” she defiantly replies, and waits for him to strain against his restraints, for his hands to curl up in fists, for his knees to buckle.

Instead, his eyes flicker with something that seems like pride or at least recognition. When he tilts his head back, she can tell he’s reevaluating her.

_They’re the only two in this room that have killed another human being. Can he see the blood dripping from her hands?_

“You were in my home,” he rasps, his chest rising. He’s breathing out of his nose and she has no idea what it means. “Why were you in my house?”

No anger. No malice. No fists. Just questions, flared nostrils and an obvious switch from “home” to “house” that she wouldn't dare point out.

There’s a voice outside—the DA, she’s pretty sure—and Matt’s hand is around her waist, or somewhere too high above it for a colleague. A guy like Frank, the Punisher, will surely notice. But he doesn’t comment or react to any of that. “Why were you in my house?” he repeats, sounding wounded and oblivious to all else.

As Matt herds her out, she spares Frank one last look. It’s the second time they met, the first they’ve spoken to each other and also the first where he isn't shooting at her. Already so much has changed.

_We know. I know._

…


End file.
